tinent for a holiday with Sir Walter and Lady Trevelyan, her niece
Miss Constance Hilliard (Mrs. Churchill), and Miss Agnew (Mrs. Severn),
for a thorough rest and change after three years of unintermitting work
in England. They intended to spend a couple of months in Italy. On the
day of starting, Ruskin called at Cheyne Walk with the usual bouquet for
Mrs. Carlyle, to learn that she had just met with her death, in trying
to save her little dog, the gift of Lady Trevelyan. He rejoined his
friends, and they crossed the Channel gaily, in spite of what they
thought was rather a cloud over him. At Paris they read the news. "Yes,"
he said, "I knew. But there was no reason why I should spoil your
pleasure by telling you."

On his arrival at Dijon he wrote to Carlyle, who in answer after giving
way to his grief--"my life all laid in ruins, and the one light of it as
if gone out,"--continued:--"Come and see me when you get home; come
oftener and see me, and speak _more_ frankly to me (for I am very true
to y'r highest interests and you) while I still remain here. You can do
nothing for me in Italy; except come home improved."

But before this letter reached Ruskin, he too had been in the presence
of death, and had lost one of his most valued friends. Their journey to
Italy had been undertaken chiefly for the sake of Lady Trevelyan's
health, as the following extracts indicate:

"PARIS, _2nd May, 1866_.

"Lady Trevelyan is much better to-day, but it is not safe to move
her yet--till to-morrow. So I'm going to take the children to look
at Chartres cathedral--we can get three hours there, and be back to
seven o'clock dinner. We drove round by St. Cloud and Sevres
yesterday; the blossomed trees being glorious by the Seine,--the
children in high spirits. It reminds me always too much of
Turner--every bend of these rivers is haunted by him."

"DIJON, _Sunday, 6th May, 1866_.

"Lady Trevelyan is _much_ better, and we hope all to get on to
Neufchatel to-morrow. The weather is quite fine again though not
warm; and yesterday I took the children for a drive up the little
valley which we used to drive through on leaving Dijon for Paris.
There are wooded hills on each side, and we got into a sweet
valley, as full of nightingales as our garden is of thrushes, and
with slopes of broken rocky ground above, covered with the lovely
blue milk-wort, and pur